Category Archives: Restaurants

Best Burgers in the Mountain West

Big, beefy burger with an onion ring cap at Burger Dive in Billings, Montana

Americans are pinkos? When it comes to ordering burgers medium rare at a lot of places, yes. Heck, some burger joints recommend it.

Meanwhile, in Canada, many restaurants are so afraid of incurring the wrath of health inspectors, they cook their patties to a shoe-leather well done.

Thus, regardless of where you come down on the health issue, American places that offer a choice of how you want your six-ounce patty cooked have an automatic hind leg up in my list of top burgers in the mountain west. That’s because a medium-rare or medium burger, like a steak, simply has more flavour and juiciness than dead cow cooked brown all the way through.

Other criteria that move burgers up my list are:

Fresh-ground, locally sourced meat from the tastiest parts of the critter
Hand-formed patties. Uniform-shaped pucks are evidence, in my mind, of frozen, imported patties of unknown origin. Indeed, they may be an assemblage of many animal parts and fillers
Good, fresh buns. An overlooked detail in many places, a good bun shouldn’t disintegrate and should add some flavour and texture to the mix
Interesting toppings certainly help, but a really good burger shouldn’t need too much stuff disguising the main attraction: the meat.

Without further ado, here are my highly subjective picks of best red-meat burgers from my travels through the mountain west of the U.S. and Canada. As always, a * indicates a standout.

*Diablo Burger can be a bit hard to find: It’s down an alley or out the back of a mall in downtown Flagstaff, Arizona. Kind of like rounding up stray cows. Which is somewhat appropriate, given all its natural meat comes from local, open-range ranches. My search for this hole-in-the-wall, unadorned place is rewarded with arguably the finest burger I’ve had a recent road trip, and I’ve had some damn good ones. Because the beef is 95 per cent lean, Diablo’s recommends a medium-rare burger. And the six-ounce patty indeed comes out pink in the middle and incredibly moist and flavourful. I choose the Blake burger ($11.75), featuring Hatch chile mayo, roasted green chiles and sharp cheddar. It’s all squeezed inside an excellent, locally made English muffin with a nice touch: DB branded on top. The toppings are aptly subtle and the lettuce and slice of red tomato are on the side, for me to add if so desired. But when the meat is this good, I don’t want distractions, though I do scarf down the hand-cut Belgian fries lying beneath this burger king.

At Diablo Burger, it’s not just the cattle that are branded

Diablo Burger
120 North Leroux Street, Flagstaff, Arizona (also a Tucson location)
Monday-Wednesday 11 am-9 pm, Thursday-Saturday 11 am-10 pm. Closed Sunday

Note: Bobcat Bite is relocating to 311 Old Santa Fe Trail in late summer 2013, under the name Santa Fe Bite.

Nearly ducking my head to get through the door of *Bobcat Bite, in Santa Fe, New Mexico, I momentarily think I’ve entered a homesteader’s cabin (albeit with a pink adobe exterior and pictures of bobcats lining the walls). That’s because the low, dark wood beams are barely higher than the lanky cook’s head, and there’s scarcely room for half a dozen, tightly spaced tables and about the same number of counter seats; I’m asked to move over to make room for a couple of new arrivals. So the character of the place already has me excited. But really, I’m here for my baptismal GCCB (green chile cheeseburger for the non-cognoscenti), a legendary New Mexico concoction, and Bobcat’s version supposedly tops the list. You know it’s authentic when they ask how you want that 10-ounce, freshly ground chuck patty cooked. I go for the recommended medium rare, with no fries to sully the experience. And boy, does it deliver—two inches of one of the most succulent burgers I’ve ever tasted, with the melted chile-cheese topping adding some pleasant but not obtrusive heat. Bobcat’s GCCB is worth every bite for only $9; I don’t even touch the accompanying potato chips.

Good luck getting your mouth around this green chile cheeseburger at Bobcat Bite

Good luck getting your mouth around this 10-ounce green chile cheeseburger at Bobcat Bite

Bobcat Bite
420 Old Las Vegas Highway, Santa Fe, New Mexico
Wednesday to Saturday 11 am-8 pm, Sunday 11 am-5 pm. Closed Monday and Tuesday

Joe’s Farm Grill, a happening place in upscale Gilbert, outside of Phoenix, produces its own tomatoes and lettuce that go on its local, natural and fresh-ground chuck burgers. Despite the line, an efficient crew soon produces my Fontina burger ($9.50), loaded with roasted red peppers, mushrooms, pecan pesto and melted cheese. It takes a minute to get through the greenery and into the moist, perfectly cooked patty. The burger is wonderfully complemented with an order of rosemary-dill, panko-crumb onion rings, the crispness of the fried batter nicely offsetting the soft, slippery onion inside. What puts things over the top is sitting on the patio on a spring evening—alongside mostly young families at picnic tables—looking out at the farm and a magnificent tamarisk, its giant branches paralleling the ground before reaching skyward.

Joe’s Farm Grill
3000 East Ray Road, Gilbert, Arizona
Daily breakfast 8 am-11 am, lunch and dinner 11 am-9 pm

At Joe’s Farm Grill, most of the fixings are right off the farm.

I’ve covered this in a previous post, but *Bingo Burger, in Pueblo, Colorado certainly produced the best lamb burger I’ve ever tasted. All burgers and fries are cooked to order, and from a counter seat I can watch my thick, hand-formed patty grilled and then finished under a lid. Next come the twice-cooked fries—from San Luis Valley potatoes—tossed with a little salt. My God, these are easily the best fries on the trip, good enough I don’t want to sully them with the roasted garlic dipping sauce. The Goat Hill burger ($9.75, Colorado-raised lamb with goat cheese, mushrooms and a lemon-rosemary aioli) is right up there with it, cooked slightly pink as requested and requiring a well-hinged mouth to bite into.

Succulence of the lamb at Bingo Burger

Bingo Burger
101 Central Plaza, Pueblo, Colorado
Monday to Thursday 11 am-8 pm, Friday and Saturday 11 am-9 pm. Closed Sunday

Mountain Sun Pub & Brewery, in Boulder, Colorado boasts a lineup of 12 third-of-a-pound burgers, the Colorado-raised beef cooked to medium. The signature burger is called Date Night, an unusual medley of roasted poblano peppers, smoked bacon, melted goat cheese and, wait for it, date puree. The combination works surprisingly well, with the sweetness of the dates proving a counterpoint to the poblanos’ pungency. The obligatory accompaniment is a generous serving of hot fries that, the menu promises, will be redone if they’re not perfect.

A “date” with a fine burger at Mountain Sun Pub

Mountain Sun Pub
1535 Pearl Street, Boulder Colorado (a second location at 627 South Broadway)
Daily 11 am-1 am. Cash only

*Charcut Roast House, in my hometown of Calgary, Alberta, breaks most of my road-trip food rules. It’s in downtown Calgary, which means parking and a vacant table are hard to find at lunch. It’s fairly expensive and its signature burger is made of…. pork? Just ignore all this, and go eat at one of the city’s deservedly hottest restaurants. Here’s a tip: Get there before noon and ask for a seat at the counter, where you’ll get a ringside seat of a first-class team of chefs in action.

A friend and I both order the house-ground burger, a massive nine ounces of a unique blend of sausage and beef (70-30%), accompanied by a pile of Parmesan fries and homemade ketchup. Partway through the grill-top cooking, co-owner Connie DeSousa (she finished third in Top Chef Canada; check out the tattoo on her arm), peers over the counter and asks if we’d like an egg and some aioli spread on that burger. After nodding yes, we tuck into these juicy monsters, held together with thick, gooey cheese and a bun that miraculously survives the mauling. Sure, it costs $17, but for one of the better and bigger burgers I’ve had anywhere, it’s still good value. And if we’d paid attention to the name, the Share burger, we could easily have split it.

Charcut Roast House
101, 899 Centre Street SW, Calgary, Alberta
Monday-Tuesday 11 am-11 pm, Wednesday-Friday 11 am-1 am, Saturday 5 pm-1 am, Sunday 5 pm-10 pm

Honourable Mentions: Sugar Nymphs Bistro, is in the tiny town of Penasco on the scenic High Road between Santa Fe and Taos, New Mexico. But it’s definitely a destination restaurant, thanks to the reputation of owner and former Greens Restaurant (San Francisco) chef Kai Harper Leah. I only had a delicious bite, but my sister said the green chile cheeseburger was one of the best burgers she’s tasted.

Lovely green chile cheeseburger at Sugar Nymphs Bistro

It doesn’t get more local than Chuckwagon Cafe, in the heart of cattle country, in the town of Turner Valley, an hour’s drive southwest of Calgary. Owner and chief cook Terry Myhre finishes steers at his nearby ranch and has them processed into various cuts for dense, hand-formed burgers or steak benedict.

The burgers are almost straight off the range at Chuckwagon Cafe

At the The Burger Dive, in Billings, Montana, my Blackened Sabbath is an unusual combination of blackened seasoning, blue cheese, bacon, garlic mayo and the kicker, a thick onion ring that provides a contrasting crunch to the luscious burger.

Authentic Mexican Taco Stand: in Hamer, Idaho

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Thank goodness for inquisitive friends. Otherwise, who would ever take the exit off I-15 towards Hamer, a flyspeck of a town north of Idaho Falls? Just look for a little roadside taco stand before you get into town, Colin and Liz tell me. Sure enough, there it is—a little lean-to shack off a van, though at first glance I couldn’t tell if it had been abandoned or was just vacated. But a small sign says “open”, so I wander around back and look up to see a little old lady in a hairnet hustling towards me from a nearby house. “Are you open?” I ask. “Si.” My Spanish is about as good as her English, but it doesn’t take long to scan the brief menu board and order tres tacos, two pork and one beef. Cilantro? Si. Radeesh? Si. Salsa? Si. I soon have a paper plate loaded with steaming, flavourful and piquant fillings atop fresh tortillas, all for $5.

I’m not really sure of the name, Rico Taco, maybe? The hours and exact address? Who knows. It doesn’t matter. Just go. It’s a delightful experience and as authentically Mexican as you’ll get, certainly in Idaho, short of being invited into her kitchen.

From Buena Vista to Aspirational Aspen

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Lovely Arkansas River near Buena Vista, Colorado

Like many of the area towns, Buena Vista (pronounced Beeyoona by locals) combines the holy trinity of mountain biking and river running or fly fishing the upper Arkansas River. Locals and visitors can also develop an appetite by running up one of the nearby 14,000-foot mountains.

I generally research my road-food stops in advance, to maximize the odds of hitting the best eateries. But occasionally, I like to wing it, which often means following the old formula of looking for the most parked vehicles. This leads me to Evergreen Cafe just as the rush for the $5 breakfast special is ending. That gives me room to find a counter seat near the grill, which provides added entertainment as a new cook is being schooled by the exacting owner. On the second try, my over-easy eggs pass approval and arrive perfectly cooked, along with a pancake and sausage patty. The sharp-eyed owner notices me watching the action and asks, “Who are you?” “Just a traveller,” I say, as I furtively slide my notebook into my briefcase.

Evergreen Cafe
418 Highway 24, Buena Vista
Daily 6:30 am-2 pm

For such a small place, Buena Vista is a serious coffee centre. At the south end of town, there’s Brown Dog Coffee Company (713 South Highway 24, daily 6:30 am-9 pm), where you can get a nice in-house-roasted coffee, a slice of coffee cake or a sandwich. You can also drive down historic Main Street to *Buena Vista Roastery (409 East Main Street, daily 7 am-6 pm). There, you can pick up a pound of Kenyan to go or sit in a comfortable cafe and enjoy a pour-over coffee along with a house-baked bagel or cheesy hot pocket. Not content with running a vibrant business, co-owner Joel Benson is also the town’s mayor.

Buena Vista Roastery is a great place for a java and a snack

Heading north of Buena Vista on Highway 24, you can continue to the historic mining town of Leadville. Or you can hang a left on the twisting Highway 82 that climbs all the way to Independence Pass, at a lofty 12,100 feet, before plunging down to Aspen.

Wonder why it’s called Aspen.

Aspen is one of those aspirational places that perfectly fits the line “the billionaires are pushing out the millionaires.” It’s a beautiful but highfalutin, spotless resort town, where the coiffed regulars wear down sweaters and are pulled down sidewalks by well-bred dogs. (One waitress who also looks after a number of properties for seasonal residents tells me she has to run out and FedEx a forgotten sweater to an absentee owner.) Still, amongst the high-end galleries and clothing stores are a surprising number of excellent, affordable eateries. After all, the help have to eat somewhere.

I make a beeline to Poppycock’s Café for just one reason. “Would you like to see a menu?” the waitress asks. “No thanks. Just an order of oatmeal buttermilk pancakes, please.” Apparently, I’m not alone. The signature oatcakes are so popular, they ship some 50 two-pound packages of the mix every week, more around Christmas. I can see why. Unlike normal hotcakes, these are moist and dense, like hot oatmeal. The corn griddle cakes also sell like, pardon me, hotcakes; you can buy that mix, too. In house, the latter come with Poppycock’s pistachio sausage patties.

The oatmeal buttermilk pancakes are a hot seller at Poppycock’s Cafe

Poppycock’s Cafe
665 East Cooper Avenue, Aspen
Monday to Saturday 7 am-2:30 pm, Sunday 7 am-2 pm

Make sure you get a counter seat when you eat at *Johnny McGuire’s Deli. At lunch, most people are standing, waiting for their food to take out or to eat at a sunny, outdoor table. But what you want is a front-row seat to watch short-order cooking at its finest. The Spanish-speaking cooks I observe are a blur of coordinated action. As one guy flips grilled steak slices and onion onto half a toasted sub, the other is simultaneously putting greens and sauce on the other side and then quickly cutting the sandwich with a big knife. Despite what looks like a time-consuming line, half a dozen sandwiches are ready in a couple of well-orchestrated minutes. Soon, I’m biting into a Marley, a hot, juicy combination of grilled steak, onions, barbecue sauce, cheddar and veggies that dribbles down my chin. The cold subs—such as one loaded with turkey, ham and bacon—are equally good. Johnny McGuire’s makes things easy by charging the same price for all the subs, the cost varying only by size; the $7.50 eight-incher is plenty for most appetites, especially if accompanied by some hand-cut fries.

Short-order cooking at its finest at Johnny McGuire’s Deli

Johnny McGuire’s Deli
730 East Cooper Avenue, Aspen
Daily 9 am-9 pm

Big, delicious wraps come out of this tiny Aspen place.

It’s called *The Big Wrap, but it could well be the definition of hole in the wall. Walk by too quickly, and you might miss its location, down a few stairs from street level and not much wider than the front door. Walk a few steps inside and you’ve reached the back counter. Needless to say, there’s no bathroom and only a handful of stools. Given what Aspen’s sky-high rents must be, I’m sure this tradeoff in size allows Big Wraps to deliver just that: hefty, delicious wraps that are a steal at under $7, especially in a resort town. The creative concoctions include my choice of a To Thai For—grilled chicken or tofu, peanut sauce, jasmine rice, black beans and crunchy confetti slaw stuffed into a chili tortilla. It’s a two-napkin explosion of flavour. Other inventive combinations are mashed potato and grilled steak or grilled chicken and couscous; they’re what co-owner Babs calls her science experiments.

Here, for instance, is my To Thai For

The Big Wrap
#101, 520 East Durant Avenue, Aspen
Monday to Saturday 10 am-6 pm. Cash only

Another lower-level eatery, 520 Grill also offers some good, affordable lunch and dinner fare. Try the seared ahi tuna or grilled Portobello mushroom sandwiches or the kale and quinoa salad (520 East Cooper Avenue. Monday to Friday 11 am-9 pm, weekends 11 am-5 pm). If you need a beverage to go with all this eating, Victoria’s Espresso and Wine Bar has some potent French Press coffee in their pump pot and offers a range of breakfast baked goods, salads and curries. 510 East Durant Avenue. Daily 7 am-9 pm, except 10 pm Friday and Saturday.

Margarita’s Marvellous Dishes

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Danny and Evgeny show off the fabulously creamy, fruity oatmeal at Margarita’s Dishes in the Calgary Farmers’ Market

In honour of Easter, here’s a short post on a terrific family-run operation at the Calgary Farmers’ Market. With its counter service, Styrofoam plates and plastic utensils in a small food court, Margarita’s Dishes may look like fast food, but everything from the sausages and cottage cheese to the jam and sauerkraut is homemade eastern European cuisine. Mother Margarita is supposed to be retired, but she can often be seen wearing an apron in back of son Danny Korduner, who always makes you feel welcome.

My brother-in-law and sister have been eating breakfast here for years, but it took my good friends and frequent customers Nancy and Dennis Stefani to prompt this post. Here’s their report:

“There are many excellent culinary delights at the Calgary Farmers’ Market, but it is hard to beat a comforting bowl of hot oatmeal from Margarita’s—luxuriously creamy and topped with loads of fresh fruits. They make it to order, so you’ll have several minutes to get your espresso from nearby Fratello Analog Cafe. By the time you return, your oatmeal will be hot and ready.

“Margarita’s makes the best sauerkraut we’ve ever tasted. If you think you don’t like sauerkraut, then you haven’t had Margarita’s. And there’s the incredible blintz with homemade cottage cheese filling – mmmmm! Also, they make pyrogies, latkes, schnitzel, bratwurst, and cabbage rolls made with Silver Sage beef. They make delicious borscht, too. All these can be taken home for later and some items can be purchased frozen. Enjoy!”

Great capos, pour overs and even cold-brewed coffee at Fratello Analog Cafe in the Calgary Farmers’ Market

Calgary Farmers’ Market and all its vendors
510 77 Avenue SE
Thursday to Sunday 9 am- 5 pm

Hey, I’m heading off on an extended road trip to New Mexico, Arizona and Utah. Any suggestions for some great independent, affordable eateries I should check out on my trip?

American Versus Canadian Restaurants

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Americans wear their colours more proudly than Canadians

What distinguishes American from Canadian restaurants? That is, besides the lower prices in the former, a lot of the time.

Aside from Canadian, or back, bacon—which you don’t actually see that much in Canadian restaurants—we Canucks don’t have much to offer in distinct regional cuisine. Even with the one solid entry of poutine, many Canadians outside Quebec used to look aghast at this artery-choking combination of fries, gravy and cheese curds before it became trendy.

Americans, particularly in the south, can counter with grits, collards, beignets, biscuits and gravy, barbecue, pulled pork, chicken-fried steak, Philly cheesesteak and that odd combination of fried chicken and waffles. Indeed, Mexican cuisine, or its Tex-Mex or New Mexican offshoots, has made far greater inroads on restaurant menus than anything Canada has to offer.

At a lot of U.S. diners and cafes, I’ve noticed, the bill is presented almost as soon as you’ve told the server you don’t want anything else. It’s done in a matter-of-fact way that I don’t mind, sometimes with the comment “Pay whenever you’re ready.” I prefer this casual efficiency to the more common situation in Canada of having to catch the server’s eye and ask for the bill. Speaking of this, I’ve heard a number of U.S. servers use the term “ticket” instead of “bill” or “check” (“cheque” if you’re Canadian).

It seems odd to me that Canada is ahead of the U.S. in anything regarding technology. But so it is with credit cards. We have followed the European example of using credit (and debit) cards with embedded chips, whereby you punch a four-digit code into a portable machine instead of signing a slip of paper. But in the U.S., using this same chip credit card, I’m never asked for anything more than a signature.

In the U.S., signs always direct you to the “restroom”. In Canada, it’s more commonly called “bathroom” or “washroom”.

At U.S. places where you order at the counter, I’m often asked “Here or to go?” My intuitive response is to say, “to stay” instead of “here.”

Canadians say “cinnamon bun”, Americans almost invariably “cinnamon roll.”

Finally, we Canadians don’t say “eh” nearly as much as is rumoured (“rumored” for you American spellers). Just like y’all don’t say “uh-huh”.

Any other dining Americanisms or Canadianisms I’m missing?

From Pueblo To My Favourite Colorado Town: Salida

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Gorgeous Arkansas River flowing through Salida, Colorado

A half-hour’s drive south of Colorado Springs on the I-25, Pueblo is a much quieter, more Latino-based town with nice brick buildings and a river walk in the historic downtown. While strolling these streets, drop into The Daily Grind Cafe for a coffee and maybe a breakfast burrito in this cozy café. You might even want to sit in the distinctive red “hand” chair.

Be careful not to sit on the middle finger, Daily Grind, Pueblo

The Daily Grind
209 South Union Avenue, Pueblo
Monday to Friday 6:30 am-11 pm, Saturday 7 am-11 pm, Sunday 7am-9pm

(Note: I’m repeating this pick from my Best of 2012 road trip eats, but it’s well worth it). When I walk into *Bingo Burger, the very helpful, friendly server tells me my lamb burger will take 10 minutes to prepare—somewhat surprising since there’s only two other customers in the restaurant. But then I see why. All burgers and fries are cooked to order, and from a counter seat I can watch my thick, hand-formed patty grilled and then finished under a lid. Next come the twice-cooked fries—from San Luis Valley potatoes—hot out of the fryer and tossed with a little salt. My God, these are easily the best fries on the trip, good enough I don’t want to sully them with the roasted garlic dipping sauce. The Goat Hill burger (Colorado-raised lamb with goat cheese, mushrooms and a lemon-rosemary aioli) is right up there with it, cooked slightly pink as requested and requiring a well-hinged mouth to bite into. The most popular menu item is the basic Bingo Burger, with pueblo chilis worked into the beef patty. Owner Richard Warner gets about 75% of his meat and produce from area farmers, and it shows, easily justifying the slight premium charged for these superior products.

I wouldn’t blame if you bit your computer screen, Bingo Burger, Pueblo

Bingo Burger
101 Central Plaza, Pueblo
Monday to Thursday 11 am-8 pm, Friday and Saturday 11 am-9 pm. Closed Sunday

A hop and a skip away, Richard’s wife, Mary Oreskovich, runs the killer *Hopscotch Bakery, which turns out artisan breads, daily sandwiches and to-die-for sweets. The sweet treats include an “orange beast” (croissant dough, orange zest and sugar); a kitchen sink cookie with chocolate chunks, almonds and pecans; cream cheese brownies and honeymoon bars. The challenge here is restraining myself.

How about a cookie or three at delectable Hopscotch Bakery in Pueblo

How about a delectable cookie or three at Hopscotch Bakery in Pueblo?

Hopscotch Bakery
333 South Union Avenue, Pueblo
Tuesday to Friday 7 am-4 pm, Saturday 8 am-4 pm. Closed Sunday and Monday

If you want to experience a longstanding Pueblo tradition, drop into Pass Key Restaurant and order a Super Pass Key Special. It’s a house-made, slightly spicy Italian patty that’s grilled and stuffed inside a mini-loaf along with three cheeses. Puebloans have been eating these sandwiches for more than half a century. The story goes that when former residents return to Pueblo, they stop at Pass Key before visiting their families. As an outsider with no emotional attachment, I find this sandwich a decent change from the regular roadside fare and not nearly as artery clogging as described by some online commentators.

Pass Key Restaurant
1901 US Highway 50 West and two other Pueblo locations
Opens daily at 11 am. Closed Sunday

The nice thing about road tripping without deadlines is making spontaneous decisions, which invariably lead to interesting encounters. So it is when a highway sign inspires me to take a detour into sleepy Florence, located along the Arkansas River and sustained by antique shops and a high density of area prisons, so I’m told. I walk down the main drag and into Pour House Coffee Roasters, intrigued by the presence of an in-house organic coffee roaster in such a small place. So while I sip a nice French Press coffee (only $1.95), I chat with young owner Ken Paul, who’s up every morning at four, baking breakfast treats as well as later roasting coffee and making quiches, quesadillas and chicken salad sandwiches.

Pour Coffee House Roaster owner Ken Paul no doubt needs a few coffee shots for all his roasting and cooking

Pour House Coffee Roasters
202 West Main Street, Florence
Monday-Tuesday 6 am-8 pm, Wednesday-Friday 6 am- 5 pm, Saturday 7 am-5 pm, Sunday 7 am-1 pm

Just down the street, you can get a nice slice of quiche or pie at Aspen Leaf Bakery and Café. I’ve already eaten two lunches by the time I get here, but Colorado Springs reader Kay Williams Johnson calls it a hidden treasure, well worth the drive for the “fabulous sandwiches” and “best pastries in the area.”

Aspen Leaf Bakery and Cafe
113 West Main Street, Florence
Monday 11 am-3 pm, Tuesday-Thursday 8 am-4 pm, Friday-Saturday 8 am-5 pm

Salida (pronounced Sal-eye-da by locals), is my favourite Colorado town. It’s a nice mix of vibrant arts community (check out the local sculptures) and a lot of young folk playing on the Arkansas River and hills around the leafy town. The historic brick downtown buildings also contain interesting galleries, eateries and drinking establishments. “It’s a great place to be broke,” says a guy who holds down three jobs to make ends meet. But I spot a new condo project along the river, perhaps a sign that Salida will not long remain a relatively undiscovered gem of a mountain town. (By the way, props to Mike Ryan of Mike’s Automotive for quickly fixing my jammed back seat, which wouldn’t fold down, and not charging me.)

Even the kayaks are turned into art in Salida, Colorado

Close to the Arkansas River, *The Fritz is a cozy, local bar/restaurant that serves sandwiches by day and excellent small and larger plates by night. To me, the atmosphere is more intimate and exuberant at night, when the beer taps really get running. The burger plates (heavy, slightly rare patty) with sweet potato fries are great as are smaller dishes of beet, pear and gorgonzola salad (a bargain at $3.50) and sliced, medium-rare steaks with dijon cream ($6), all washed down with local microbrews. The thick-crust mac and cheese is also very popular.

The Fritz, in Salida, has some fabulous food

The Fritz
113 East Sackett Street
Daily 11 am-2 am

Here’s how things work in small Colorado towns. Sitting in The Fritz, we start talking to a couple at the next table, Kim and Scott, who happen to own Moonlight Pizza & Brewpub. We don’t make it there that trip, but a year later I make a point of visiting their small corner eatery, fronted by several mini kayaks. The fine pizzas start with a chewy, made-daily crust, topped by layers of meat in my Caveman, which the menu describes as having turned “yoga instructors into snarling savages.” Moonlight—which donates 10 per cent of its Monday proceeds to local projects—also brews some flavourful ales, along with house-made sodas such as limeade, vanilla cream and root beer.

A Caveman pizza and a house-made ale hit the spot at Moonlight Pizza

Moonlight Pizza & Brewpub
242 F. Street
Opens daily at 11 am for lunch and dinner

It’s enough that a place the size of Salida would have one pizza joint with a brewery. But within two blocks of Moonlight is another fine pizza place, Amica’s Pizza, which also doubles as a brewery. I’m not sure if it’s the water or just a place where people want to live… and make pizza, and beer.

Amica’s Pizza
136 East 2 Street
Daily 11:30 am-9ish

Cafe dawn (named in part for co-owner Dawn Heigele) is a cozy hangout for a good, strong early morning coffee or a late afternoon Colorado craft beer or wine (weekday happy-hour specials). I don’t usually order outsourced breakfast treats, but the local Flour Girl make a tasty quiche baked in a brioche pastry; if need be, you can even heat it yourself in a microwave.

Early morning patrons at Cafe Dawn in Salida

Cafe dawn
203 West First Street
Daily 6 am-6 pm. Cash only

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Marathon Mouth

Great road trip eats in western U.S. and Canada

Category Archives: Restaurants

Best Burgers in the Mountain West

Authentic Mexican Taco Stand: in Hamer, Idaho

From Buena Vista to Aspirational Aspen

Margarita’s Marvellous Dishes

American Versus Canadian Restaurants

From Pueblo To My Favourite Colorado Town: Salida

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